Posts From September, 2013

Last night I talked about digital imagery that is comparable to what we do. Well, today I saw some of the "other" stuff. PSA has a division where images are more creation in post processing than capture on camera. There are some talented folks who have a real good handle on software and a very vivid imagination or some really good adult beverage. Many of the images did not look at all like photographs, but artwork. They were quite spectacular.

I can't say I am impressed enough with the concept of creating imagery mostly with software to give it a try, but I wouldn't discourage anyone either.

Another observation is how important personality is in photography. Hanson Fong was tonights featured speaker (not Gary Fong). Talk about a guy having too much fun! It's him. He is a portrait photographer, and I expect all of his shoots are packed with laughs and high energy. His presentation was laced with good humor and excellent information.

If you're into portraiture, make sure your camera is on a tripod and spend your time humoring the clients. All the images he showed had subjects with 'genuine' smiles (not the 'say cheeze' smiles). His mantra is "make the woman look good and the man will pay!" I'll bet he's expensive.

I'm down in Portland at the PSA Conference. Last night I saw the digital images that were awarded some recognition, and about half of the images that were submitted, judged, and considered suitable for "Acceptable for Competition" from which the images that received recognition were drawn. 2800 images were submitted from makers in 17 countries, and a little less than 700 were accepted. I can say I did see some brilliantly done work. The overwhelming majority of the images were well processed but not manipulated to any obvious degree.

The upshot of the presentation to me is: we do work comparable to all but the prize winning images in the "Open" category. Even then, we have work that is very close in quality and presentation. We need a lot of work in the "Nature" category.

The Nature images were quite spectacular. Only about 10% of them were from 'exotic' locales (Africa, the Antartic, etc). Many looked to be shot locally to the makers. There were submitters from Breat Britain, Germany,The Netherlands, Australia. So to us that's pretty exotic, however the subjects were owls, raptors, and mammels similar to what we can see here. Most images appeared to be from North America. Most of those were song birds, and raptors that we can see in our area. There were a few dozen macro shots. Many of pretty common subjects including Tent Catepillars, and Dandilions, Maple leaves, mushrooms, and the like.

I think we should feel pretty good about what we do. We just need to do more of it!